I was cruisin' in my Sting Ray
Late one night
When an XKE came up on the right
He pulled down the window of his shiny new Jag
And challenged me then & there to a drag
I said "You'e on buddy, my mill's runnin' fine
Let's come off the line now at Sunset & Vine
But I'll go you one better if you've got the nerve
Let's race all the way,
To Deadman's Curve"

Gianni Poggio, an elderly Italian man who lived on the outskirts of Positano, Italy, went to the local church for confession.

When the priest slid open the panel in the confessional, the man said:
"Father, during World War II, a beautiful Jewish woman from our neighborhood knocked urgently on my door and asked me to hide her from the Nazis...So I hid her in my attic."

The Priest replied:
"That was a wonderful thing you did, and you have no need to confess that."

"There is more to tell, Father..She started to repay me with sexual favors.
This happened several times a week, and sometimes twice on Sundays."

The priest said:
"That was a long time ago and by doing what you did, you placed the two of you in great danger, but two people under those circumstances can easily succumb to the weakness of the flesh.
However, if you are truly sorry for your actions, you are indeed forgiven."

"Thank you, Father..That's a great load off my mind...I do have one more question."

Valentine's Day is less than a week away.
Why not send a Valentine's Day card to former-Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, showing your support for him?
(Because it looks like he won't be released anytime soon, thanks to Obama's Justice Department)
Send cards & letters of support to:
Don E. Siegelman
Prisoner # 24775-001
FPC PO Box 5010
Oakdale, LA. 71463

New York Times
January 13, 2015

"Lawyers for Don Siegelman, Ex-Governor of Alabama, Again Seek His Release from Prison"

ATLANTA -- For the second time in less than a month, lawyers for former Gov. Don Siegelman of Alabama on Tuesday took his corruption case into a federal courtroom in an attempt to speed his eventual release from prison.

During arguments before the United States Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, a lawyer for Mr. Siegelman, Clifford M. Sloan, said allegations of misconduct by a prosecutor merited further exploration.
He also said the judge who presided over the former governor's 2006 trial had erred in applying federal sentencing guidelines.

BUT A JUSTICE DEPARTMENT LAWYER, JOHN-ALEX ROMANO, INSISTED THAT JUDGE MARK E. FULLER HAD IMPOSED AN APPROPRIATE PRISON SENTENCE -- 78 MONTHS -- AND THAT THE UNITED STATES ATTORNEY AT THE BEGINNING OF THE INQUIRY, LAURA CANARY, HAD SUFFICIENTLY HONORED HER PLEDGE TO RECUSE HERSELF FROM THE CASE.

To check the balance of the scales of justice, look at how the system treats the very rich....
and the poor.
As we've seen, Wall Street barons have grossly fattened themselves by running frauds and scams that wreaked trillions of dollars in damages to working families, homeowners, and taxpayers -- yet not a single one of them has been indicted or seriously pursued by the law.
More recently, such corporate profiteers as JP Morgan Chase have paid billions of dollars in fines for serious criminal acts, but the executive criminals who pulled these capers have skated free without ever being charged.

Now, meet Gina Ray, who is neither a CEO nor a serious offender, but a hard-hit, low-income American.
She's one of hundreds who're being jailed, not by the police, but by a growing network of corporate fee-chasers empowered by state legislatures to fine and imprison poor people who've committed minor infractions.
Ms. Ray, an unemployed 31-year-old in rural Alabama, got caught-up in this privatized probation system over a speeding ticket.
Her problem mushroomed, and she was unable to pay, so the corporatized legal system locked her up and hit her with company fees for each of the 40 days she was behind bars.
Her original $179 ticket has now surpassed $3,000.
She was not told that she has a right to a court-appointed lawyer or offered any alternatives to more fines and jail.

"We hear a lot of 'I can't pay the fee," says one of the private prosecutors, adding chillingly that,
"It's not our job to figure that out."

If members of the brand-spanking new, Republican-controlled Congress are at all confused about why We the People consider them just another load of bovine excrement, they should look at their bill called "Promoting Job Creation and Reducing Small Business Burdens."
Only one day after being sworn in, the GOP introduced this deceitfully-titled bill as it's top-priority, must-pass piece of economic legislation.
But forget jobs and small business - those are just gauzy shams to hide the fact that the bill is nothing but a thank-you gift to the party's sweethearts on Wall Street.

A little background.
First, having wrecked our economy with their reckless casino gambles in 2008, the banking giants had to swallow the 2010 Dodd-Frank reform bill that put some modest limits on their destructive gambling habit.
Second, the banksters went running to Republicans, wailing that the Dodd-Frank wrist slaps were hurting their profits.
Third, they pledged to back sympathetic GOP candidates over those mean ol' Democrats in the 2014 elections.
Fourth, they did,
And fifth, with Republicans now in charge, it's payback time for banksters.

The chief pay clerk is Rep. Michael Fitzpatrick, chair of the Financial Services Committee.
He even tried to ram his Wall Street giveaway through the House with a rigged process that would've prevented any debate.
No need to question what's in it, he averred, for it merely makes "technical corrections" to the Dodd-Frank reforms.

Yeah - "technicalities" like putting us taxpayers back on the book for bailing out banksters when their speculative gambles fail, allowing them to take more risk with our money, and letting them hide more of their scams from public scrutiny.

An attractive woman goes up to the bar in a quiet rural pub.
She gestures alluringly to the bartender who comes over immediately.
When he arrives, she seductively signals that he should bring his face close to hers.
When he does so, she begins to gently caress his beard, which is full and bushy.
"Are you the manager?" she asks, softly stroking his face, with both hands.
"Actually, no," he replies
"Can you get him for me? I need to speak to him," she asks, running her hands up beyond his beard and into his hair.
"I'm afraid I can't," breathes the bartender - clearly aroused.
"Is there anything I can do?"
"Yes there is, I need you to give him a message," she continues huskily, popping a couple of fingers into his mouth and allowing him to suck them gently.
"Tell him," she says, "that there is no toilet paper or hand soap in the ladies room."

Look out America --- here comes the Trans Pacific Partnership!
Dubbed "a corporate coup d'etat" by Public Citizen's Global Trade Watch, it's a grandiose grab for power masked as a trade deal, allowing an unprecedented level of global corporate rule over Americans.
Let's take a quick look at what we'll be getting into.

The trade hoax.
Of the document's 29 chapters, only five address tariffs and other actual trade matters.
The other 24 consist of various ways to "free" corporations from any accountability and from any responsibility to the world community's common good.

Bye-bye "Buy American."
TPP dictates that all corporations based in any member nation must be given equal access to the public dollars that any government spends on equipment, food, highway projects, etc.
Thus, our own national, state, and local governments would no longer be free to give preference to suppliers of our choice.
"Buy American" and "Buy Local" programs could be challenged by private corporations.

Wall Street rides again!
If anyone doubts that the pact is a corporate boondoggle dressed in trade clothes, let them read it's shameful financial provisions.
"Too big to fail" laws, ensuring that the cost of a bank's collapse would be borne by investors, not taxpayers?
Under TPP, giant global banks could scamper into private tribunals to grab billions of our tax dollars if they have to comply with such laws.
Also, our nation's financial regulations would have to be "harmonized" to comply with TPP's extreme deregulation, re-creating the anything-goes Wall Street ethic that crashed the world economy in 2008.
A Robin Hood tax on volatile, super high-speed speculators?
Nope...TPP specifically lets global banks challenge and kill these laws.